What Words Name a Person Place Thing or Idea

When you think about it, nouns, along with verbs, form the basic structure of the English language. After all, a noun is a naming word. It's used to identify, or name, a person, place, thing, animal, or idea. When small children are learning to talk usually the first words they learn are nouns, like "mama" or "daddy."

A noun, and a proper noun as well, have many different functions in a sentence. They can act as a subject, an adjective, an adverb, as a direct or indirect object, an appositive, or a subject or object complement. In addition to different functions, there are different types of nouns, too. This article will concentrate on one particular type, namely the proper noun.

What is a Proper Noun?

While a noun names a person, place, thing, or idea a proper noun gets more specific. It gives us the actual name of the person, place, thing, or idea.  A person's name is a proper noun. So are the names of states, streets, rivers, oceans, countries, companies, institutions, churches, and more.  You can see more specific examples of a proper noun below.

Proper Noun Examples

One of the easiest ways to fully grasp the meaning of proper nouns is to compare them with common nouns.  A common noun refers to the general names of things.  Look around you and name the items you see.  A desk, a chair, a lamp, a window, a door.

When you go shopping, who do you see?  A man, a child, a salesperson, an attendant, a toddler, a policeman.  These are all general, common nouns.  Now let's compare common nouns to proper nouns.

Common Noun vs Proper Noun

Common Noun	Proper Noun
man	James
woman	Julie
state	California
company	General Motors
store	Neiman Marcus
restaurant	Applebee's
mountain	Mckinley
country	France
waitress	Betty
chair	La-Z-Boy
soldier	Lieutenant Mark Davis
river	the Mississippi River
institution	University of Georgia

Here are some example sentences to further show the difference between a common noun and a proper noun.

Man = common noun; James = proper noun.

We loved every state on the western coast but California was my favorite.
State = common noun; California = proper noun.

Lieutenant Mark Davis is a soldier in the United States Army.
Soldier = common noun; Lieutenant Mark Davis = proper noun.

When we go to our favorite restaurant, Applebee's, we always ask for Betty, our favorite waitress.
Restaurant, waitress = common noun; Applebee's, Betty = proper noun.

 Capitalizing a Proper Noun

The rules for capitalizing a proper noun are pretty simple. A proper noun always begin with a capital letter.

However there are times when a word can be used as either a common noun or proper noun and you might get confused as to when you should use the capitalized form. For example, "father" can either be common or proper.

One rule for thumb is that if you are using the word as a title and name it should be capitalized.

I had dinner with my father last night."

"Would you like to have dinner with me, Father?"

See the difference? In the first example the word was used more generally as a common noun. In the second example, the word was used like a name. In this instance the term "father" took the place of the actual name, such as "Bob."

To make things a little clearer for you, here is a list of proper nouns categories.

• Holidays: Christmas, New Year's Day, Hanukkah, Thanksgiving
• Geographical areas: San Francisco, Europe, Spain, the Nile River
• People and pets: Mrs. Caroline Jones, Rip Van Winkle, Snoopy
• Books, Newspapers, Magazines: Wuthering Heights, Atlanta Journal, Southern Living
• Companies and organizations: Google, ChildFund International, General Electric
• Religious terms: Christian, Methodist, Hindu, God, Allah
• Places, buildings: Yellowstone National Park, Empire State Building, Ritz-Carlton
• Titles: President Bush, King George, Queen Elizabeth, Judge Judy (titles are not capitalized when they're referred to in general terms.  For example: The criminal appeared before the judge.
• Languages: English, French, Italian
• Brand names: Coach, Pepsi, Lucky
• Possessive Proper Nouns

Creating the possessive form of a proper noun follows the same rule as the possessive of a common noun.  Add 's if the word is singular or if the word ends in s just the apostrophe. Plural nouns that end in s get an apostrophe at the end.

• Mary's coat
• United States' health care program
• Georgia's swampland
• Kansas' prairie lands

Proper names that end in s are made possessive by adding 's: Charles's house.  It's also correct to just add the apostrophe, such as withJesus' mother.

What Words Name a Person Place Thing or Idea

Source: https://www.k12reader.com/term/proper-nouns/

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